Thursday, November 11, 2010

So umm...I thought we did this for fun...right?

o/

Its been a while since I ranted on here, so its time to fix that.

Ahem...

Why do we play these mini games anyways? (just skip the addiction part, the only cure for that part is financial ruin, moving on...) I thought it was fun. not to win at all costs (WAAC) not to intentionally piss off your opponent, not to cheat, and not to play for a tie as an overall strategy (I'm not referring to the mid-game realization that I can't win, so I go option 'B', a tie)

I was listening to a 40k podcast the other day which was going over the IG codex and it really pissed me off. Apparently, the only way to play IG is with the 'all mech/vendetta, all vet., all melta list'. Everything else is pretty much pointless & to use it you pretty much don't know what your doing. WAAC on the air waves I guess. Everyone sits in their passenger compartments tiddling thumbs while their chimeras blast away, vendettas outflank & lascannon you to death, and then turn 4-5 the chimeras lunge forward for objective grabs & meltagun drive-bys. Maybe they're hard core tourney players & can think of nothing else, but as an opponent would you find playing vs that fun? I've played vs. variations of that more than once, and...it sucks. Quote: 'If I see an IG list at a tourney, all I really need to see is their heavy choices, the rest of the list I already know, so their list is pointless...' In a tourney maybe, but no narrative, theme, fluff, nothing? Now lets broadcast that opinion to the geek world so that newer players start to see that this is the way to play...

Bleh. I'm not a regular subscriber, and promptly 'unsubscribed', moving on to my next rambling bit...

Playing for a tie as an overall strategy. Huh? I've seen this several times over and again last week. Here was the set up: capture & control scenario, pitched battle deployment. We have a local player, who ALWAYS puts his objective on the top of a building. Not, like the 2nd floor, but the 4th or 5th if not the roof top (we have some tall buildings @ the shop). Invariably this is done vs. an army that has no jump infantry available (we're a small group & our armies hold few surprises). Meanwhile his opponent's objective is in a reasonably approachable place (i.e.: in a table corner, and/or no higher than the 2nd floor of a building/ruin). The most recent case in which I saw this was vs. a Foot slogging Thousands Sons army, and I figure that it would have taken 4-6 turns of them doing nothing but running to maybe get there (ignoring the entire Necron army facing them including the ones in said building). Meanwhile the Necrons hunkered down in deep cover, and never advanced. The only thing going forward was the Deciever who's sole intent was to contest the enemy objective.

He never intended to win, just to tie.

The Thousand Sons player was pretty pissed off @ the end of the game (General Pickett didn't enjoy his similarly suicidal charge into the enemy guns either), which as expected, ended in a tie (the deceiver was rendered into a chaos spawn midway across the table). Now what was the point of that? Who really goes into a game without even trying to win? And while I'm bitching about this particular game (that I didn't even play in), the Necrons 'forgot' their destroyer flying bases (again), then tried to claim cover that they would have been above were they actually on their bases...

I mean, you don't have to throw an opponent a 'soft/easy' army to have a fluffy fun list. You don't even have to be close to winning to have a fun game. Some of my most memorable games, that are joked about years later are the ones where my army crumpled like tin foil, and ended with the last model making a suicide charge across the table. I fondly recall one of those now:

Okay dude, you got one guy left, you wanna just cede the game?

OFFEND ME WILL YOU?

SHING! (yes I said that, it went with the simulated motion of my commissar drawing his sword)

I CHARGE THE HIVE TYRANT! DIE YOU ACCURSED MONSTROSITY!

(Due to his trusty refractor field he survived for two rounds vs. the hive tyrant, and the legend of 'The Venerable Commissar Borg' was born...)

But that was a game, in which my army was literally murdered, yet, the opponent's intent was to have fun, and we BOTH did have fun. But it seems that all to often anymore, that there is a slowly expanding attitude that winning is everything (from a game play point of view, painting is something else entirely). Spectacular paint jobs & dialogue aside, I think one of the reasons that The Gentleman's Ones has been so successful as a blog, is that b.smoove focuses on the narrative as much as if not more than the game play itself. I'd really hate to think that that sort of view point is starting to be an anomaly, rather than the norm.

....

...and then Da Masta Cheef, steps back too far, and falls off his soap box. Dazed & confused, he has no idea as to whether or not any of the above made any sense, nor does he feel like editing (as it probably doesn't, which means he'd just delete it). So, if it doesn't, well then he apologizes for subjecting you to such drivel assuming you read this far, but rants are like that, they just kinda come out, with little if any rational thought put into them).

5 comments:

Yeah, you should have posted humorous pics to punctuate your point. All good points though. I think the ticket is balance. As in all things moderation. All of the folks who go too far into one aspect of this hobby (WAACs, Fluff Bunnies, whatever you cann the painting & sculpting equivalents) have a lot less fun and take themselves more seriously than they should.

Amen. However, in addition to my victory by turning the Necron "god" into a ball of writhing flesh that now serves Tzeentch, you forgot to mention the spectacular display of the Dreadnought popping 1 of 2 Monoliths (yes, 2 'liths and a "god" in a 2k list) which attempted to claim cover from a small ruin it was "hovering in" (as it, too, did not actually have its flying base). Then again, you'd also have to mention how that same Dreadnought proceeded to destroy a friendly Predator on the next turn.

@Counterfett: Well, I'd have probably added in pictures had I not just been ranting & instead actually thought out what i wanted to say before hand (I did go back and edit some horrid typos after this post was published though).

@Happyspawn: actually 2 liths & a god in a 2k list isn't bad IMO, were it 1500pts then that would be cheesy. However at that level it should be expected I think. 2k allows for all the bells & whistles.

But before you agree with everthing, if you read back through, you'll see my pot shots @ mech IG that doesn't move, so its not like you came through unscathed either...

For me it's the predictability of a game that makes it no fun. I can handle playing WAAC people, we have a few at the shop. What makes the games against these people boring and no fun is that I know whenever I face them what they're bringing to the table. Oh, a unit may change, or wargear be altered, but the core of the army is always the same. I'd rather face variant WAAC army lists each time I played them than the same one each time.

About Me

I got into 40k when I was 19, and my state of personal finances has been all but destroyed ever since. These days I play primarily X-Wing and Bolt Action, but still dabble in 40k, WHFB, CBT, as well as various other odds and ends. I am also weening myself off of a long term addiction to the EVE Online MMO. Basically I'm just your standard issue gaming geek.

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